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emoticon613-
A hip-hop/rap etc. style song can be a very upbeat, joyful, funny song, to gladden the heart of someone who is down.
A heavy metal song (and for that matter a more somber rap song) can, believe it or not, with the right lyrics, speak powerfully about religious fervor to people feeling down. I know of more than one Christian punk rock/heavy metal band whose lyrics are very neutral and could easily be adapted to fit very frum Jewish hashkafos, and there’s no doubt in my mind and heart that Jewish kids with an American taste in music who are feeling down would benefit from such tunes. What makes the genre angry in general is not the actual tune, but the lyrics and the tone of voice of the singer. When that is modified, you can have a very nice song in my opinion.
Furthermore, let’s talk about other genres. classical music I don’t assume you are nauseated by, and neither opera, except they might not be your taste. Does country bother you? There are a lot of country songs which not only have nice tunes but have very meaningful lyrics – it isn’t about lost love every time. Jazz, when it doesn’t sound like classical music, has really nice tunes to any regular frum person’s ear, it’s just the lyrics that make it not-nice sometimes. (I don’t know where it came from that people who never heard non-Jewish music call any music with a heavy beat Jazzy, when I say Jazz I’m referring to the 20s until the 50s style music in general.) What about the light rock and soft rock? Granted, the lyrics may sometimes bother you, but can you not appreciate any of the tunes? Even heavy rock, it’s generally the words that make the song disgusting sometimes, but the tunes could be adapted easily into regular, upbeat, nice songs.
I could go on and on, but my point is very simple. I don’t believe you are truly against goyishe music per se. Therefore, if someone plays a song at your wedding which is a cover of some groovy funk song, if the tune fits the mood there’s no reason to be upset. If, however, the not-nice lyrics are sung, or it’s the kind of song that everyone will be reminded of the not-nice lyrics, e.g. a very recent pop song, then it is inappropriate. But I don’t think there is anything wrong for a singer to sing a seventies song from Germany which sounds very nice as long as he changes the lyrics to make them ‘kosher’.
sofdavar-
In my posts above I specifically differentiated between tunes and lyrics. Of course lyrics can be bad and disgusting. My whole point was to say that if a singer uses the tune but with different words there is no problem, because there is no inherent ‘tumah’ in the tune, but obviously nivul peh is assur.
From what you wrote it seems your posek says it is not ‘in the spirit of the law’. I think everyone should follow their rav, and if your rav tells you that you may not listen to such music then you should follow him. But I don’t understand the psak. If there is anything wrong at all, then those who talk about using non-Jewish tunes for davening (sources I quoted above) should make some mention of that. But they don’t, they just say it’s fine.